I've often considered it but, if it went wrong, I'd become a hate figure ... ... even more than I am now
The worry is that he's desperate not to lose money from this and Eastleigh, despite being **** at both. He has his asking price, one that sees him walk away with a profit. The trouble is that no one will pay him that given the state we're in now. Barely functioning academy, still in league one, no parachute payments, still paying for Cattermole, pandemic putting the whole league at risk, possible wage cap . He could sell now but not for the money he wants. He does, however, think we'll be in a better financial position than a lot of others in this league. He thinks this is his chance. One more spin of the wheel. If he can get us up this season (which will require our recruitment team to finally get things right) then he can say to buyers that we're in the championship, I believe the last of the big contracts will be paid up, there should be more certainly as you'd hope the virus will be more controlled. At that point he might get what he wants. It's worth his while (from his perspective) having one more go, especially when he can sell Mumba for 500k to help out. He's going to stay, can't see anyone buying us off him now whilst he refuses to budge on his asking price
Why does he not close down the 4m academy cost? from his point of view quick saving. Then just have a L1 standard academy.
Probably because it's a great selling point, it sounds much better saying you're selling a club with a Premier league stadium and a category 1 academy. Previously it'll have been worth it for him because he expected to be gone by now, so he won't have expected the cost to go on for more than one season. Once he admits the academy has been scaled back it makes it even harder to justify the selling price. They seem set to claw some of that back by flogging Mumba. Being category 1 also means we get slightly more compensation when players leave, so they've probably made a bit back as a result of flogging everyone decent. They seem to be setting the ground work for scaling it back mind, if a sale doesn't look likely this coming season I expect it'll be shelved by the 22/23 season
Exactly, selling point a while back, but that hasn't proved to be the case. If he gets money from the FA, how much, do we know? I doubt that its anywhere near £4m.
Old article, but gives some detail about Cat 1 etc https://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/s...gory-1-and-3-academy-as-part-of-eppp-changes/ But more up to date here https://trainingground.guru/articles/burnley,-palace-and-leeds-forced-to-wait-to-go-cat-1 And only 7 cat 1 clubs in the Championship. https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport...ws/swansea-city-trevor-birch-academy-17708253
Swansea is a good example of how costs and revenue can quickly rise and fall... https://www.swanseacity.com/news/update-chairman-2
Hopefully he wont close it and just have a L1 standard academy to go with his L1 Standard First Team. We would struggle to get Cat1 status back if we reduced it, we would lose pretty much any chance we have of getting the better local youngsters to join us as they would go to Boro or the Mags for better training. It would be in my opinion an absolute disaster if we run the academy even further into the ground
What could possibly go wrong , they would have to be going some to make things worse than it is at the minute !
The Scunthorpe owner said the season ending would cost them 650k, our costs are higher. I've no idea what Donald's net worth is but I'll say one thing ... ... around half of the millionaires I've worked for appear to operate in massive debt. I don't understand that level of finance but, while they have huge assets, fabulous cars, etc, there's been occasions when I've had a call from them asking to speak to a waiter, shop, whatever. I've had to pay a bill, on my card, and been reimbursed later. One London lunch bill, for a recent employer, came to £2,800 for 4 people, I still have the WhatsApp conversation on my phone as a daft souvenir. So, whatever Donald is worth, I very much doubt he has much spare money and that's the problem here. He wants to accumulate but doesn't have the means to speculate. I've no real knowledge of why he's taken £10 million from 'FPP' but it's not because he has loads of dosh sloshing around himself. He's in bother imo and must be desperate to get out of a mess he's created himself ... .... no one to blame Mr Donald, this is all your fault.
Whilst I agree with most of this, he is going to be seriously hampered by loss of revenue from season ticket cancellations and no gate money. If say 5,000 people have cancelled, which is a modest estimation imo, at an average of £300 each that's £1.5m. Then we have on average 8,000 per game who buy a ticket or pay on the gate, at an average of £20 per ticket is £160k per game. If there are no games this side of Christmas we're looking at about 10 home games without this revenue, so another £1.6m, so combined they're looking at a £3m deficit. There'll be the loss of beer and food sales, but I've not included that as there'll be costs for staffing that they'll save on so that will cancel it out. So we're a minimum of £2.5m worse off if you deduct the Mumba fee, and that's not including all of the signings that we'll have to make. It's a hell of a gamble to take to get us up again, and if we don't, it'll only get worse. He really needs to sell imo.
The bad gambler analogy really does fit with Donald. He is desperate for us to get promoted next season and the odds are against him. The competition for promotion is likely to be more intense and we've largely got the same, failed, recruitment people in place.
